Discovering Hidden Profit: The Podcast is a must-listen for CEOs and executives dealing with continuous industry disruption and increased business complexity.

This podcast features in-depth interviews with the authors of the groundbreaking new business book, Discovering Hidden Profit by Peter Marks and Robert Martichenko. Timely and informative, this podcast reveals an operational blueprint for business leaders to achieve the next level of system-wide improvement and collaboration required in today’s world of constant change and challenge.

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Episode 7: What’s Wrong with the Typical Product Planning Process?

Not all product life-cycle functions drive planning for inbound logistics, manufacturing, or outbound distribution. Or if they do, they do so without collaborating across the organization, or they do so without content knowledge of the supply-chain operations they are planning. This is one of our main challenges and therefore is a significant SCA opportunity.

In this episode, Robert will explain how to expand the role and function of the Product Life-Cycle Planning processes, and how to connect this role with the other three core business processes to create an extended value-stream perspective that creates maximum customer value at the lowest cost.

Operating principles require cross-functional collaboration to be implemented successfully. In this mini-series, Robert Martichenko, co-author of Discovering Hidden Profit, recommends which operating principle(s) should be embraced by the core business processes of: Business Strategy, Product Life Cycle Management, Sales & Marketing, and Supply Chain Operations.

When establishing Business Strategy, supply chain functions are often not sufficiently involved, resulting in unnecessary complexity and waste. In this episode, Robert will discuss how an organization should view its supply chain as a lever for profitability in top-line revenue growth, reduced operation costs, improved working capital, and margin improvement. This is accomplished by implementing a business strategy based on the operating principle of supply chain performance as a competitive weapon and strategic differentiator.

Episode 5:Does Your Organization Operate by Unified Principles?

An operating principle is an operations framework or guideline that an entire organization believes is the right strategy or tactic for goals and results to be realized. Operating principles are critical in today’s complex business environment as they guide leadership and employee behavior, decision making, selection of methods and tools, progress measurement, and ultimately determine whether leadership is aligned on how goals will be achieved. The absence of operating principles can result in frequent changes of strategy and tactics, leading to confusion and frustration across the organization. Therefore, they are critical for setting direction and deciding what work the organization will perform.

In this episode, Robert Martichenko, co-author of Discovering Hidden Profit, helps us understand how organizations can operationalize principles that support value-stream thinking, and how the four core business processes should align and collaborate in order to be successful.

Episode 4:SCA Gear Series Pt. 3: Implementing Management Systems

A management system is a vehicle for executives to prove their full intent towards a business initiative, and Supply Chain Advancement (SCA) implementation will succeed or fail based on a commitment to support it. The management system sets goals, guides the organization to make correct decisions, recognizes deviations from plans, and brings visibility to initiate quick countermeasures in order to achieve operational and strategic goals.

In this episode, Peter Marks, co-author of Discovering Hidden Profit, explains how to formalize a management infrastructure and leadership team to guide the implementation of SCA. This includes aligning teams around the system and developing a communication plan to show full executive commitment.

Episode 3:SCA Gear Series Pt. 2: The Importance of Education for Business Change Management

While Supply Chain Advancement (SCA) is not a complicated concept, operational implementation is challenging because most leaders and organizations are focused on optimization at a single-process or functional level. Therefore, integrating core processes and taking an extended value-stream approach to decision making is new territory for many leaders. The best method to guide change in a management process is training and education.

In this episode, Robert Martichenko, co-author of Discovering Hidden Profit, explains how leaders, managers, and all team members can leverage formalized training and education to understand the purpose of SCA as a business initiative and guide the change in the implementation process. This includes a collective understanding of the benefits of advanced supply-chain performance, the overall strategy, and tactical implementation steps.

Episode 2:SCA Gear Series Pt. 1: Setting Macro-Level Business Goals

Before we begin our work in Supply Chain Advancement (SCA), we need to understand the prize for completing the work. That is, how much profit is being left on the table because we do not have advanced supply chain performance? This requires objectively understanding the current state of the organization, picturing the ideal future state, and setting realistic yet challenging, goals.

In this episode, Robert Martichenko, co-author of Discovering Hidden Profit, outlines four steps the C-suite can take to identify and set macro-level targets – the “true north” -- for extracting hidden profit.

Episode 1: What’s the Next Frontier in Business Improvement?

Are business leaders leaving results on the table with today’s continuous improvement methods like lean and six-sigma? What’s the next frontier?

In this first episode, host Derek Browning interviews Robert Martichenko, author of Discovering Hidden Profit, who has some thought-provoking and practical answers. It turns out that when organizations collaboratively operate by certain principles and management methods, they can connect four core processes (business strategy, product life-cycle management, sales and marketing, and supply chain operations). And when this happens, improvement efforts start to impact the bottom line in big ways.

The Book

DISCOVERING HIDDEN PROFIT

Extended Value Stream Decision Making

“Discovering Hidden Profit builds our understanding and ability to create fundamental core-process connections in order to enable real business improvement.”

Kenny Larson, President, Slumberland Furniture

“Discovering Hidden Profit identifies the most important business issues that exist today, yet seem difficult to correct. The path forward and leadership roadmap for long term success has arrived. “

“Discovering Hidden Profit is the Right book, written by the Right authors, at the Right time, providing us the Right Solutions to the Right business problems.”

Dr. Thomas Goldsby, Professor in Business, The Ohio State University

Meet the Authors of the Book

Peter J. Marks

Peter J. Marks, CEO of Executive Consultant which he founded in 2013, advises business leaders on leadership and strategy development. He is also an Independent Director at Broadcom Limited and serves on the boards of several private companies.

Previously Peter served in various senior management roles with Robert Bosch GmbH, which he originally joined in 1977 and where he remained until December 2011. Most recently, from 2006 until his departure in December 2011, Peter served as Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer of Robert Bosch LLC where he managed all of its business sectors in the Americas. He was a member of the Board of Management of Robert Bosch GmbH with responsibility for worldwide coordination for manufacturing and capital investment.

Robert O. Martichenko

Robert O. Martichenko is Founder and CEO of LeanCor Supply Chain Group, a trusted supply-chain partner whose mission is ToAdvance the World’s Supply Chains. Robert’s entire 20+ year career has been committed to third party logistics with a focus on end-to-end supply chain management.

In addition to leading LeanCor, Robert is a senior instructor for the Lean Enterprise Institute and the Georgia Tech Supply Chain and Logistics Institute, a frequent speaker, and a board advisor for a private electric company. Robert has written several lean and supply chain books and articles - most notably Everything I Know About Lean I Learned in First Grade and the 2013 Shingo Research Award winning books, People: a leader’s day to day guide to building, managing, and sustaining lean organizations and Building a Lean Fulfillment Stream (Lean Enterprise Institute).